


The Second Task

by unionforj



Category: Union J (Band)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-03-03
Updated: 2013-03-03
Packaged: 2017-12-06 19:05:45
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,051
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/739083
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/unionforj/pseuds/unionforj
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Harry Potter AU. Josh may be a champion, but there are some things that he's really, really not good at.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Second Task

“Are you… counting?”

“Shut it, Lucy.” Josh snipped. “One, two, three, and one, two, three, and-“

“I can’t believe this.” Lucy bemoaned. It didn’t exactly help Josh’s confidence that he had to bribe her to be his date. But all Champions were required to have them, hell, they had to open the Yule Ball. JJ had told Josh that it shouldn’t have been hard for him to get a date- he was a seventh year, not bad looking guy, he had good hygiene (which was actually saying something, unfortunately) and he was the Hogwarts Champion.

Most of the guys from Hogwarts that were single wanted girls from Beauxbaton: exotic, unknown, beautiful, and hell, they were girls with fucking accents. But the girls from Beauxbaton wanted the blokes from Durmstrang, who all seemed like they could break guys like Josh with their jaws.

A lot of the Hogwarts guys went with Hogwarts girls. That was just how it went- and Josh found a lot of the Hogwarts girls staring and giggling in his direction. George had clapped his back. “You’re the best, mate, the champion. Why wouldn’t they want you?”

Josh, however, didn’t want them. He didn’t want a girl, any of them. The shame was deep in his stomach, making him sink through the stone floors of Hogwarts (which really, really sucked since in Task 1 they had to fucking swim in the lake) like the Fat Friar. But Josh was a pure blood, and even after the wars, it wasn’t like he could just be that one guy in the family that diluted the line.

It only took one person. Seriously. He’d managed to tell JJ, after too many butter beers, and JJ had been going on and on about his hippogriffs for so long that Josh had wanted to beat his head in. So to change the subject (yeah, it was a bad idea, but he was drunk and stressed and a Champion in a Tournament that had killed two teenagers already, seriously, why hadn’t it been made illegal yet), he just blurted it out. JJ had been confused for a while, and then was rather accepting. Then he pointed out, that yeah, Josh would have to dance with a girl.

By then, most had dates. Lucy had been planning on not going- she thought it was crap. She thought they were pranking her. When they convinced her that Josh was, in fact, desperate, she agreed. Once they agreed to say that she and Josh had wild monkey sex all night long, and let her exit the boys’ dorm during the Breakfast Rush Hour, curing her of her ‘unfortunate’ reputation of a boring, stuck up prude.

 

“Can you at least smile?” She asked.

“Can you shut up? I’m trying not to loose count.” He didn’t have to worry about picking her up. He’d been able to lift Jaymi up last week- he’d been training all year for the tournament so a girl should be easy, right, and she was short. “And you didn’t even want to do this!”

“I’m on a date with the champion, I’m the belle of the ball, and he looks like Moaning Myrtle,” Lucy’s nostrils flared. So he gave her a large grin and tried to laugh like she’d just made a joke, dipping her just in the nick of time, seeing as she’d made him miss a beat. “Better.”

As soon as the song ended, he dropped her arms. “I’m going to go get some Pumpkin Juice.”

“She is simply charming!”

Josh spun around, lips already pressed in a thin line. He was really in no mood for any one Jaymi’s games. Jaymi was muggle born- things were different for him.

“She really is, actually!” Josh replied. “Her hair smells like-“

“Death and loneliness?” Jaymi quirked an eyebrow. Jaymi had suspicions about Josh, had basically been stalking him since the beginning of the year. It wasn’t fair, because Josh really wanted to hate the bastard and his fiancée.

Josh didn’t actually know what Lucy’s hair smelt like, so he just narrowed his eyes. “Shut it.”

“Oh, possessive already? You’re turning into a right Edward.”

“What- who’s Edward?”

Jaymi shook his head, sucking down his pumpkin juice faster than normal- not letting it hit his tongue. “Bloody purebloods.”

Josh tilted his head. “Uh, yeah that is rather the point.”

“That is not what I mean at all!” Jaymi protested, putting down his drink. The contents sloshed with the force of his will, but hey, Josh was a Champion. A little slam here and there didn’t scare him. “All I am saying is you are in you’re seventh year- you should take a fucking chance!”

“I did take a chance. With my life.” Josh pointed out coldly. Not many people had decided to put their names in the cup this round, after Cedric Diggory. But he had; he wasn’t so sure if it was to celebrate becoming of age or to prove what an idiot he was.

He supposed he couldn’t be too much of an idiot if he was picked Hogwarts Champion.

“Oh, look at it statistically, thousands people have competed in the Tournament since it was invented. Only maybe a dozen have died, most of them were idiots and one was because a man tried to start a war.”

Josh shook his head. “Don’t say stuff like that, I’m trying to hate you.”

***

“Why is Josh talking to Jaymi Hensley?” Ella asked.

George twirled her back in. Technically they were now allowed to dance however they wanted to, and fast, thrumming music was now playing, but Ella liked the waltzing. She liked the way it made her dress robes spin.

“I don’t know, but it can’t be good.” George released her hands and grabbed his pumpkin juice. Well it wasn’t exactly pumpkin juice- clearly someone on the planning committee had gotten to it, and gotten to it early, because George was feeling buzzed.

But he was also actually, factually thirsty. What a predicament.

“You’re only having the one, yeah?” Ella asked.

“You’ve had two!”

“I’m used to it,” Ella snickered. George waved her away, and flounced over to the Champion and the Teacher’s Pet.

“Jaymi Hensley, are you bothering the Champion?” He demanded. “It is my duty to- to tell you to buzzer off.”

“Buzzer off? George, are you okay?” Josh asked.

George widened his eyes to look as innocent as he could at Josh. “It is not… Bring Your Own Butter beer, I’ll tell you that.” George nodded insistently. Jaymi started snickering into his own glass, his own pumpkin juice, and George felt his own hatred rising- just a bit. George wasn’t one to really hate people.

“How many of those have you had?”

“Just a few.” Jaymi replied smoothly. He gestured towards Ella, who was bravely dancing solo around the perimeter of the dance floor, which may have been the fault of the third drink in her hand. “Not quite sure if it’s as many as your date.”

“We’re friends, and she’s fine,” George insisted. He’d seen Ella so drunk she’d tried to hump the Whomping Willow. That had been one fun night. Well, not so fun.

“Oh, friends,” Jaymi taunted, sending a knowing look, which really annoyed George, to Josh. “Everyone seems to be just friends with each other. Isn’t that nice?”

“Am I missing something?” George asked.

“George and I aren’t even friends, he’s just helping me with my charms!”

George narrowed his eyes. Jaymi threw his head back and laughed once more. George knew he wasn’t exactly popular. He was a half blood and a Hufflepuff, and he spent most of his time curled up with Ella in the library.

When the Hogwarts Champion asked him, George Shelley, to tutor him for the Second Task, he had actually thought things might get a bit better. They had fun- they laughed, and joked, and teased. Sometimes they didn’t talk at all, but it was still so comfortable. George thought that constituted a friend.

George spun on his heels and started pushing through the mass of students. He mutely could hear Josh yelling at Jaymi behind him, a hissing of Look what you’ve done now but he really didn’t care. He wanted to hex someone, and if he saw either of them in the next thirty seconds, it would likely be them.

“Monkey, what is it?” Ella asked.

“I want to go. Now.” George burrowed his nose into her shoulder puff. He wouldn’t cry. He wouldn’t cry.

“Oh what’s the big, bad champion done?”

“He came to me, I didn’t go to him.” George insisted. “He wanted to know how to slice a tree in half. We even ate lunch together, I don’t get it.”

“And I am claiming you’re juice now.” Ella muttered. George reluctantly let her take his goblet from him. “I’m not drunk.”

“Sadness and alcohol don’t mix well, Monkey.”

“Henderson!”

“Eat slugs, Cuthbert.” Ella snapped. George spared Josh one last look over his shoulder, as the boy tried to gain his attention. Josh would be fine- his Accio Charm was perfected and his Point Me was working splendidly. He was physically in great shape- not that George really paid much attention to that but there was the whole thing about… needing to run… quickly, right and being physically able to do… stuff in the tournament.

Whatever.

“Yule Ball sucks,” George told Ella as they crawled through the passageway into the Hufflepuff basement. “Let’s be vegetarians.”

***

George ignored all of Josh’s attempts to reconcile. They weren’t friends after all. George was merely tutoring him in Charms, and now that the Task was days away, he didn’t need anymore tutoring.

It didn’t help that there were rumors flying about Josh’s escapades after their fight. It was just lovely to know that while George was crying his eyes out, Josh was getting busy with one of the meanest Witches around.

“I said I was sorry,” Josh insisted. “I didn’t mean it.”

“Lovely to know that you regularly say things that you don’t mean.”

“Jaymi was pissing me off, I just wanted to shut him up.” Josh insisted, grabbing the elbow of his robes.

George glared. “Don’t make me petrify you.”

“Oh, come off it, Georgie.” Josh smiled, really smiled, and showing the gaps in his teeth. He’d lost him in his second year, playing Keeper when a Quaffle hit him in the face. Since then, he hadn’t really smiled, being embarrassed by his missing teeth, but George had always found it so endearing.

“No,” George covered his eyes with his hands. “I won’t fall for it. I’m mad at you.”

“Come on then.” Josh took George’s wrists in hand, tugging them down lightly. “Come on. Don’t make me tickle you.”

George rather liked being tickled; he liked laughing to the point of being absolutely breathless and his stomach hurting. But he really didn’t want that in public, it would be so terribly embarrassing. So he peaked up over his hands, trying to look like his mum did when he went on Will’s broom before he was ‘of age.’

Then he saw an over stuffed monkey, tucked under Josh’s chin, with wide, elongated eyes. It was enchanted, obviously, for its eyes were blinking softly as if it were tired. “Here’s my apology.”

“Joshy!”

“I know it’s not much. But you like monkeys, right, and I was a right toad. I do consider you a friend.” Josh looked really humble, then. George smiled, and teasingly pushed Josh’s shoulder.

“You would’ve done well as a Hufflepuff, hard enough worker.” George told him. Josh smiled again, softer this time, his mouth closed, knowing his apology was accepted. George took the monkey in his hands, petting his belly.

“I’m happy where I am.” Josh replied. It was true that the Slytherin house had some bad reputation, but it was also known for people who could think quickly, on their feet, get out of bad situations, people who could fight with words instead of wands.

“Mr. Shelley?”

George looked away from the stunning blue of Josh’s eyes, towards Professor Flitwick. “Yes?”

“Headmistress McGonagall would like to speak with you.”

George nodded, looking to Josh once more. “Thank you for my monkey.”

“It’s no trouble.” Josh crossed his arms. “I’d still like to meet you later; for tutoring, of course. Just one last session before the big day.”

“Your Bubble Head Charm is fine, great even. It will last as long as you need it, and it’s not like you’ll need to swim.”

“But, George-!”

“You need to sleep tonight. Then get a good breakfast; that is all, just relax! You will be fine. I’ll see you off, okay?” George promised, following Professor Flitwick. He waved goodbye to the Hogwarts Champion, keeping an eye on the tiny teacher. He’d never really been to the Headmaster’s Office- he was a rather good student, after all, the definition of a Hufflepuff: loyal, honest, hardworking and fair. He didn’t really get in trouble.

Okay, he and Ella did make midnight trips to the kitchens, but it was right there. It was perhaps a five-minute jog. How could he not?

“Sugar Owls.” Flitwick said clearly. George quirked an eyebrow at the password, hugging the monkey to his chest. Flitwick looked up at him and shrugged. “A tribute to the last headmaster.”

George tried not to think about it. The stone falcon moved aside, revealing a circular staircase that started moving. George quickly climbed on, but Flitwick did not. “Professor?”

“It’s alright, Mr. Shelley. I’ll see you soon.”

The staircase was not fun. So as soon as he saw a door, he pushed his way through, growling at moving staircases and muttering about his beloved stationary one back home.

“I didn’t know you were muggleborn.”

George looked up and sighed. Jaymi was leaning back in a red, stuffed chair. “I’m not, and what are you doing here?”

“I don’t know. Professor Grubblyplank sent me. Said it had to do with Olly.”

“Olly- that Durmstrang Champion?” George’s eyes went wide, and he sank into the blue chair next to Jaymi’s. Jaymi was a Hogwarts student, and Olly, as previously stated, went to Durmstrang, the school known for instructing their students in Dark Arts up until the Second War, the school that didn’t allow muggleborns entrance. “You’re fraternizing with the enemy!”

“Oh, hush.” Jaymi waved his hands. “I’ve been doing it since I first laid eyes on him.”

George shook his head, not wanting to hear another word. George’s thoughts started straying- had he done something wrong then forgotten about it? Perhaps the professors were upset about his feud with Jaymi? But would they really bring them to the Headmistress’s office for that?

After a few moments of awkward silence, the door opened once more, with the two Headmistresses, one of Hogwarts and one of Beauxbaton, leading a girl with soft blond hair and wide eyes, into the room.

“Welcome, students. Sit, sit,” Headmistress McGonagall said. The blond girl, the only one standing, sat over by the couch. George gave her a soft nod as hello, and then tucked the monkey into his bag. He was a sixth year; it was a little embarrassing to be holding a stuffed animal in front of a pretty girl. “I’m sure that you all have some questions as to why you have been brought here.”

George nodded, looking between Jaymi and the girl.

“The second task starts tomorrow, as you all know.” Headmistress McGonagall folded her hands carefully on her desk. “The Champions have been told that they are looking for something of incredible, unknowable value that has been stolen from them.”

“Oh, this can’t be good.” Jaymi dropped his head into his hands.

“This is tradition.”

“Leigh-Anne said zhat zey were taking her broom, or something.” The girl said.

Headmistress Maxime snorted, and McGonagall shook her head. “Brooms can be replaced, Miss Edwards. You won’t be hurt, the centaurs have been instructed against it.”

“Oh, instructed, that is really comforting. We’re instructed to do lots of things, you know, but we still do them.” Jaymi retorted, standing up in his seat. George pulled his knees up to his chin.

“You are not the target, here, Mr. Hensley, merely the bait.”

“What if they don’t succeed?” Jaymi asked. “Pinnock thinks she’s going after a broom, what if she gets in trouble, doesn’t realize it’s blondie down there, and gives up?”

“Then Miss Pinnock will receive half points, and the centaurs will return Perrie to her. We would not put you in danger.”

“Then why go through the trouble?”

“Because the Champions have to bring you back to the castle. They have to go through the dangers twice, once worrying about both you and them.”

The Headmistresses promised to look after their things, to keep them safe. They would be sleeping, really, unconscious, and if anything were to happen, they wouldn’t feel it until they were once again safe on the other side of the finish line.

As they were herded towards the task, towards the Forbidden Forest, Madam Maxime, the headmistress of Beauxbaton was comforting Perrie Edwards in French, and George was curling inwards towards himself, getting closer and closer to the forbidden forest. It was forbidden for a reason. They weren’t supposed to go in it.

“I suppose it’s sort of romantic.” Jaymi was spouting bullshit and he knew it. He was paler than the briefs he was wearing and shaking like a leaf in a hurricane. “I mean, Olly is going to risk his life for me. Well, points for me, hopefully.”

“You were awfully upset about this, and now you’re trying to romanticize it?”

“Everyone who has died in this, except for that Diggory fellow, they died because of stupid mistakes. They died when they weren’t thinking. Do you know when people don’t think?” Jaymi asked. “During Task Two, when someone else takes greater priority than thinking. They rush to get their boyfriend or girlfriend or sibling, they rush to get them back safe, and they don’t check themselves. That’s how they die. But they won’t let us die, and we’ll end up with their blood on our hands.”

George felt sick.

“Zis is a forest.” Perrie gestured towards the tree line. “I do not understand, how can you keep control of the Task when it is so…?”

“There is a perimeter, and the centaurs will be helping us.” McGonagall handed out three potion bottles to them. “This will keep you unconscious, and send out an aura to the animals that will alert them that you are not the target.”

George closed his nostrils and knocked the flask back, keeping it from touching his tongue as best he could. It was a viscous, vile liquid, though, nearly solid. But as soon as it hit his throat, he could feel his eyelids drooping, and he started to sink to the ground. He could hear a soft clopping, the sound of hooves on grass.

“Take care of them. Keep them safe, Fenrir.”

***

It wasn’t quite like being asleep. George felt warm, burning heat coming from somewhere very close. He could hear the sound of a horse’s hooves circling him. It all sounded like it was sound moving through water, so far away. There was screaming, at one point, and all the blood was rushing to his head.

Then he was cold, really, really cold.

Then he woke up- it was like someone exchanged his blood for coffee and he positively surged. He was in a seat, and he was still cold. His black robes were removed, he was only in his white shirt and slacks, his skin was so dirty, slick with mud- was that blood? George raised a shaky hand to his shoulder, where black cloth was tied around his shoulder.

“Spiders.”

 

George turned in his seat. Josh was gripping a steering wheel- that was a sight George had never thought he would see. The headlights were shining bright on the judges, staring at them in shock. “Remind me that I hate spiders. I officially hate spiders.”

“Are we in a car?” George asked incredulously. Josh didn’t answer, but he leaned forward, his two, shaky, muddy hands grabbed George’s face and yanked him forward. George yelped as he felt Josh’s lips smash desperately against his own.

There were cries of shock and awe, but they quickly dissipated.

“Don’t do that to me ever again.”

“I was asleep, I don’t really-“

“Shut up, Monkey.” Josh insisted. Madam Pomfrey started scooting them out of the car, which, to George’s surprise, drove itself back into the forest.

“Won’t your dad be mad?” George asked. “Those were cameras.”

“My dad’s a toad. Let him name Ashley his heir.” Josh shook his head, letting himself be loaded onto a floating bed. He was tired and wounded, and so was George.

George smiled- he knew it was embarrassing to be the eldest in a pureblood family and not be named heir. “I still have the monkey. I know it’s not on me, I wasn’t allowed to take it in the forest.”

“It’s okay, I know.” Josh insisted.

Olly apparently won this round, but that was okay, Josh hadn’t even thought about it until some reporter asked what it felt like to place second. He wasn’t at all surprised- Olly and Jaymi had apparently been dating each other at first sight. Obviously that had fueled his adrenalin much better than Josh’s or Leigh-Ann’s. He deserved this win.

Josh’s dad wasn’t so pleased to see The Gosh Champion Kiss plastered all over the Prophet. He promptly sent him a Howler, degrading him, his sexuality, and then George. George, naturally, had nearly cried.

 

Then they found out that Mr. Cuthbert’s office was flooded with hate mail, as a result of one of those reporters being present when the Howler had gone off. Mr. Cuthbert had decided to retire early.

Josh had a feeling, a rather strong one that he wouldn’t be so terribly welcome back to the Cuthbert Mansion. But after coming in a very close second place in the Tournament, and his NEWTS having flying colors, he had a feeling it wouldn’t be too hard to get a good job, high ranking at the ministry. His mother had been sneaking him funds after the whole Kiss in the Papers ordeal, and getting kicked out, setting him up his own account. He would be able to afford a place at least until he secured work. 

The most surprising was being invited to Jaymi and Olly’s wedding. Jaymi had been surprised to find that Josh no longer had the Cuthbert Coat of Arms on his Chest.

“What happened?”

“What do you think?” Josh shrugged, one arm over George’s shoulder, holding hands there. “This is the pure blood way. If I can’t continue the line, I’m smudged from it.” 

“But we are working on it. I’ve got an internship at Ollivander’s, and if it works out, he’ll start paying me within two months.” George smiled.

“And I’m going to working in Foreign Affairs Law.” Josh smiled. “George won’t even need a job soon.”

“But I want one.”

Josh nodded and smiled. “But he wants one.”

“That’s all that matters, isn’t it?” Jaymi hummed, looking towards his new husband. George sighed happily, drifting down into Josh’s. It wasn’t grand, and it wasn’t perfect in it’s glory.

“I’m sorry,” Jaymi said. George looked up, but it wasn’t him that Jaymi was apologizing to. Josh was pursing his lips sternly. “I didn’t know that- that he would smudge you from the line, or whatever its called.”

“I hear if you’re a Black then you get blasted.” George giggled. Jaymi’s eyes turned to saucers.

“It’s fine, you didn’t know. You just thought it would be better for me to be out, and in a way, you were right. I got George, and yes, though things might be tough for some time, and we’re not quite prepare, I am happy.” Josh insisted. “Now is this a wedding or not?”

Jaymi nodded, and returned to dance with Olly, and George swung his legs over Josh’s. “I am happy.”

“I am, too.” Josh smiled, showing the gaps in his teeth. One day, when they’d saved enough, they would marry, too. And their wedding would through the Jolly wedding out of the Quidditch Field.


End file.
